All Things Familiar
by Monkeybarrel
Summary: (Wild Adapter. 2-part complete) Keiichiro Kasai was not into the idea of having a family, but fortunately for him, neither was Makoto Kubota.
1. All Things Familiar: Then

Disclaimer- Minekura Kazuya owns all that is Wild Adapter

Warning- language

Notes: There are a lot of details in here that have not yet been explained in the manga, and so I had to improvise.  Once Minekura does explain more about them, like Kubota's childhood for instance, then this story can very quickly be pushed into Alternative-Universe-land.  But until she does explain, this is just one possible interpretation.  Finally, feedback is always appreciated, and thank you.

All Things Familiar - Then

Keiichiro Kasai was not a family man, even when, for a short time, he had a family to come home to.  He was a detective, albeit a little crooked, but you could say that his morality line crooked the same way the entire police force's did.  He was a man who liked his alcohol and his cigarettes and always liked them together.  He was a man who was not a stranger to women.  The one who he was a stranger to was his nephew.  

They should have been closer since they both shared a bond with a woman who recognized neither of their existences.  Kasai only saw his younger sister in the few grainy photographs from their youth, the ones that stayed pressed between the pages of his old school primer, lost deep in a box in the back of his closet.  He didn't need to dig them out though to remember what she looked like, or to remember that look of disdain she laid upon him and on their life back then.  That life though was only a memory now, since she had moved on, cutting all ties to what little family was left, and he eventually did the same, since in the end, all that was left of their family were him and her.  Or so he had thought.

Years earlier, his sister had the honor of becoming a powerful man's mistress.  Although their relationship was strangely absent from the tabloids, this powerful man's family was very much aware of her presence and they scornfully tolerated her for being his "unfortunate necessity".  Although he kept her separate from his family, he provided her with more luxury than her and Kasai's parents ever could have offered.  And thus she embraced her new life just as she embraced this powerful man, shedding her old skin and forming a new one.  So much so, that Kasai could barely recognize the girl he used to race home from school with, her feet skips ahead of his, her pigtails flying in front of his eyes.  Now, her face, her body was ripened by luxury, and seemed so cold, it was as if she had frozen herself into a permanent, finely drawn mask.  But, as Kasai found out, it was not only a new skin that was born from this embrace.

It didn't need explaining how Makoto came into the world, but why, why something so unwanted was allowed to be was a question that Kasai pondered on many times.  The only reason he could pin down was that his sister must have believed that bearing this powerful man a child would raise her status with him and with his family.  His line would continue, and it would be through her.  But he had other children, and hers, in the end, was not a welcome addition.

So Makoto was born a "nobody", a non-person among the family, and no one in that house acknowledged he existed.  Although blessed with the blood of this powerful man, he was seen as an unforgivable result of his father's unfortunate necessity.  Unlike his mother's tolerated, separate existence, he was cut completely off from them.  Because his mother wished to maintain her new life, and was angry still because her ploy of bearing a child did not raise her status, she dutifully complied with the family's wishes and removed herself from raising her son.  She did not even look at him, so he never received that look of disdain that Kasai knew so well.  But even though he was separated and ignored, Makoto was not removed from the house.  Instead of creating a possible scandal, he was quietly raised by servants and entered into school at the earliest age possible.

Sometimes, Kasai couldn't suppress his curiosity, and he used his connections to learn what his sister was doing, where she was.  And it was here that he'd learned of this nobody boy.  "What's he like?" he asked, holding the phone with one hand, and lighting his cigarette with his other.  "Does he look like her?"  He brushed back his graying hair from his forehead, and wondered, does he look like me?

"He's like…" the voice breathed in his ear, quiet and low, probably speaking from some empty corner of the house.  "He's like a ghost."

He was treated like a phantom among the living, and when he walked the halls, neither his mother nor his father would acknowledge that his cool presence had passed them by.  By the time he had left the house when he was just entering junior high, even his name on the family registry had mysteriously vanished.  He was no longer a ghost anymore, since for that to be, he would have had to have died, and now the family that bore him made sure that his very existence would never be known.

Kasai wasn't quite sure why suddenly Makoto decided to stop being a nobody at his father's home and started being an almost nobody at his.  They had never met, but one day he showed up at his doorstep, bag over his shoulder, and the end of a cigarette in his mouth.  It wasn't a complete surprise though.  A half-hour before he'd arrived, Kasai received a phone call telling him that his 12-year old nephew was coming over.  It was told to him like everything else from that side of the family, from some whispering staff member that worked for the man that his sister had borne a nobody boy to.  So when the door bell rang, he walked to it, knowing what he would meet.  What he wasn't quite sure though was what would happen next.  He wasn't a family man after all, and kids weren't his thing.

But it seemed that to Makoto, families weren't his thing either.  Even though he dropped his bag inside and took off his shoes and sat down to eat the dinner that Kasai suddenly realized he had to make for two, he never seemed to stop giving off his nobody feel.  Sometimes he was so quiet, sitting there, that Kasai could turn around and forget he existed, except for the smoke that was twirling slowly up from the cigarette in his mouth, its thin white air wafting up until it disappeared.

Kasai made his own poor attempts at communication.

"So…how was school today?"  He pushed the ash tray towards his nephew.  At first he frowned at the boy's smoking, but with his own pack and a half-day habit, he realized he had little principle to stand on.  He couldn't even use the "It'll stunt your growth" excuse because it was easy to tell how fast Makoto was growing.  Already the pants from his school uniform that he had gotten three months earlier were inches above his shoes.  He was still wearing his uniform at the dinner table, which prompted Kasai to ask how his day went.

"Dunno."  Makoto answered simply and tapped the ashes into the tray.  "Didn't go today."

Kasai stopped, a plate of hot curry rice held in his hands.  "What?  Then what did you do?"

Makoto took the plate and put it on the table in front of him.  "Little of this.  Little of that."

And that was all he could get out of him.  "A little of this, a little of that."  Kasai left for work before Makoto went to school and came back hours after classes ended, so he never was sure where the boy went during the day, dressed in his too-small uniform, his leather satchel over his shoulder.  Kasai attempted a "study hard today" in the mornings before he left, but there was never a response from the small room that had before been his office.  After a month, it was simply an "I'm off" from the entranceway, right as he was about to leave.  But with his nobody nephew only silent on the other side of the door, he stopped doing even that, and they both left just as quietly as they came.

His coworkers sometimes said, "I'll finish this paperwork.  Don't you have a kid to go home to?"  He shook his head to their offer and lit up another cigarette.  "He can take care of himself."  And Kasai knew he was right because when he did look at Makoto, whether it was across the table, or in the living room during the few times they sat silent and watched television together, he saw that he wasn't looking at a boy at all.  It was like his nephew had skipped growing up entirely and gone straight into adulthood, but was still made to wear the clothes and the body of a child, even if they didn't fit him.  His eyes showed the distance that only years of experience had given Kasai.  Everything that Makoto did, from speaking to walking to holding his cigarette, expressed a knowingness that Kasai normally only saw in the men his own age, over thirty years Makoto's senior.  

The only times he saw Makoto act closer to a child than an adult was when something new caught his nephew's eye.  His look changed.  Not entirely, since his face still held "the half smile" that Kasai considered almost mocking.  (Although he was never sure who it was directed at- to everyone else or to Makoto himself.)  But at these times, there was a slight lift at the corners of his lips, and his always narrowed eyes would widen a little as his hands reached out to hold whatever it was that caught his fancy.  It was over in a moment, but Kasai noticed it.  It was these few times that he ever saw Makoto really…alive.

He eventually figured out where his nephew was spending the days when he was supposed to be in school.  After finishing a victim's interview in Chinatown, he decided to take the long way back to the station and stopped in at one of the many small mahjong parlors that dotted this section of town.  The game was a hobby that he played often enough after a shift and occasionally during.  Stepping through the door, it was like walking into another world; one made entirely up of smoke and the clack-clack-clack of tiles being quickly but carefully placed on the boards.  He scanned the room for an empty seat when he spotted a familiar head among the crowd of players.  Walking closer, he recognized the hands quickly picking and placing tiles down.  The sleeves on his uniform were growing shorter by the day.

The table he was playing at was full, so Kasai grabbed a chair near the wall and pulled it up next to him.  The others at the table looked up and eyed him warily.  A couple he recognized from games that he had played (and won) in the past.  He brushed their dark looks off with a wave.  "Only here for a moment.  I won't ruin the game."

"You can't ruin it," Makoto replied.  "I've already won."  And to make his point, he showed his tiles to the rest of the table.  Kasai was a little taken aback both from the kid's win and also by the unrestrained cursing that the men threw down on his nephew, but Makoto only smiled in response, saluted, and took their money.

"Are you here to arrest someone?" he asked, pooling the coins into his pockets.

"Nah, just stopping in."  Kasai looked down at him.  "Did you win all that today?"

"Yeah, it's always a little slower on Tuesdays."  Makoto shrugged and stood up.  "I usually pull in twice as much."

"Damn, Makoto."  He couldn't believe this kid sometimes.  He looked up to see the table of grown men scowling back at them.  He reached out and took his nephew's arm.  "C'mon, let's get out of here."  Surprisingly, Makoto didn't pull back, but allowed himself to be led out of the parlor.

"What now?" the boy asked as they stood on the sidewalk.  Kasai was reaching down, searching his pockets for his lighter.  A hand moved out in front of his face, and he looked up to see Makoto holding his own lighter up.  He nodded and bent over a little, allowing his nephew to light his cigarette.  After a moment, he breathed out the smoke, and with it, his thinking cleared a little.

"Why don't you…use your slow day's winnings and treat your _uncle_ to dinner?"  He spoke carefully, as if testing each word.  He stayed on "uncle" for a full beat.  He looked down at Makoto who only returned his gaze, his head cocked to the side, that half-smile on his lips.  

"Okay, _Uncle_," he said.  Kasai couldn't help but smile back.  This would be one of the only times that Makoto ever called him that.  Without turning around, his nephew started down the street, and Kasai followed him, watching his back as he walked.

After a short distance, they came to an outside ramen stand.  Makoto sat up on one of the empty stools and called out to the cook busy behind the bar.  "Two of your cheapest noodle bowls, please!" he yelled out.

Kasai laughed as he sat down next to him.  "You're really treating me tonight."

They ate in their usual silence.  The only noise was the slurping of noodles and the baseball game that played out over the radio behind the bar.  When Makoto looked up to wipe the steam from his glasses, Kasai took that moment to pry a little.

"So…who taught you to play such mean mahjong?"

Makoto bent his head back over his noodles and began slurping again.  Kasai wondered if he hadn't heard him, or maybe he was ignoring him.  He was about to turn back to his own bowl when Makoto spoke up.

"Watching Lee-san," he answered, his voice low.

"Lee-san?"  Kasai turned to look at him.

"She worked at the house.  They all played in the kitchen when there wasn't work to do.  After a while, they let me in.  She was the toughest player though, so I watched her a lot.  I knew when I beat her, I was doing good."

"How long did that take?"

"Two days."  Makoto smiled into his soup and began to dig around until he found the one fish cake that the cheapest bowl of ramen gave you.  "I was about…eight.  At first they joked that they'd let me win.  But it got pretty bitter after awhile.  Soon no one who didn't want to risk losing their money came into the kitchen after one-o-clock."

"I'm surprised they didn't start poisoning your meals."  Kasai took drag off his cigarette.

"I didn't win all the time."  Makoto replied.  "Sometimes I lost.  It was one of the few places I wanted to be, so sometimes losing was better than winning."

Kasai looked over at him from the corner of his eye.  Makoto was bent over his bowl, picking at the soup.  He was grabbing nothing with his chopsticks, but instead, just made circles in the surface, breaking his reflection over and over again.

Because for a nobody, a place to stay is worth more than winning, Kasai thought grimly.  He reached into his pocket and pulled out some coins.  "This is for the soups," he said, passing the money over to the cook.  He turned to see his nephew looking up at him with that half-smile.

"What can I say, Makoto," he shrugged.  "Sometimes you lose, sometimes you win.  C'mon."

Makoto followed after him.  "Are you going back to your place?" he asked.  Kasai noticed that he never called it his.

"Nah.  I still got work to do."  He stopped by a set of stairs that went down into another mahjong parlor.  He chewed on his cigarette, and after a moment, headed down.  When he reached the door, he turned back up to see Makoto looking at him with that same half-smile.  "C'mon.  Play this old man a game."

The corners of Makoto's mouth tweaked up a little.  "I'd feel a little bad taking your money, Kasai-san."

"Sure you would."  Kasai shook his head and opened the door.  "You think you're good, kid, but let me tell you.  You don't _know_ good yet."  He stood there, holding the door open and waited.  After a few moments, Makoto started slowly down the steps.

"You're right." His half-smile widened into a full as he passed Kasai and walked into the shop.  "I won't feel bad taking it."

It was here in the dark smoke of the mahjong houses that Kasai and his nephew discovered the one thing outside of their blood that they did have in common, their skills at the game.  Few were in the same league with them, and when they shared a board, they became oblivious to anything else, including the crowd of people that often gathered to watch them-- the well-known Officer Kasai and the kid that came out of nowhere to challenge him and the rest of the Yokohama mahjong scene.  Here in the smoke, Kasai learned more about his nephew than he ever did at home.  His years of ghosting the halls had given the kid skills of perception that Kasai didn't see even in some of the most experienced of detectives that he worked with.  He got so lost sometimes just playing his tiles and watching Makoto respond back, that he realized too late that the cigarette he had lit was just a stub burning between his fingers.  He started to get up to go buy another pack when a scraping sound caught his attention.  Looking down, he saw that Makoto had passed over his own pack of Seven Stars.

"Thanks," he said, sitting back down.

"It's the least I can do." Makoto shrugged and leaned back, showing his tiles to the table.  "Since you will be paying."

Kasai swore under his breath as he dug into his pockets for both his lighter and his money.  Although he hadn't won a game against Makoto in weeks, he wasn't going to admit out loud that his nephew was a better player.  As he dropped the coins on the table, he started to regret walking down those steps months earlier since it had meant a continuing blow to his ego.  But in the end, he lit his cigarette and started again, since these times they played were basically the only home they had together.   And he realized in the back of his head, behind the smoke and the past, this little bit of home was worth losing a few yen for, even if it was to a punk-ass kid like Kubota Makoto.

And just like back in that kitchen, Makoto did take his turn to lose, but only enough to keep people guessing.  You never knew with him how long the game was going to go, or how your hand would do.  This allure, a mix of his youth, his skill, and his dry, quiet humor, made him very popular among the parlors, and there was always a crowd around his table.  He even managed a little fan club of neighborhood kids who followed him around, replenishing his cigarettes or running out to buy him a drink when he mentioned off-hand that he was thirsty.  They listened to him because he seemed just like them, but they followed him because they saw there was something more, something they couldn't figure out, but something that won them over as quickly as he won the games.   

Although it seemed Makoto didn't lose enough to keep this perfect balance going.  Having been at work, Kasai only heard this after, and the story was never clear, but on one strong day of playing, some of his opponents took it out on the boy.  Kasai saw him come home late that night, his face bruised, his pockets torn.  When asked what happened, Makoto said nothing, walked into his room, and shut the door.  Kasai found out later that his nephew had stumbled into another shop in Chinatown that day, a place that dealt with odds and ends, and "other things", a place owned by a man named Kou.  It had probably been him that had put the scattering of band-aids on the boy, but these were details that Makoto never shared.  Kasai had to piece them together himself.  "I saw some kid, looked like your nephew, hanging around some shop in Chinatown," another officer told him one day.  

Kasai kept his face expressionless as he brought his cigarette up.  "I know," was all he answered with.  

With his new "home", Makoto often came back to the apartment just as late as Kasai, if not later.  Their silent dinners were a thing of the past, and Kasai often found himself grabbing a sandwich after work and eating it cold in front of the TV.  He was on his second beer when he heard the door to the outside open and shut, the sound of feet in the hall, and the opening and closing of the door to what was once his office. 

He knew this wasn't the way things should go.  People never acted like this on TV or in the stories his coworkers would tell of their own families.  But somehow, he never did get up off that couch, mostly because he knew whatever he said to that door, he would hear nothing back.  His nephew, his growing-out-of-his-clothes, mahjong-winning, Chinatown-working, school-skipping, silent nephew wanted more than anything to remain a nobody, at least to him.  Kasai scratched his head, and smoked his cigarettes, and opened another beer, but no ideas came to him to help change this.  Even though it was his job to solve problems, this thing that shared his flat seemed impossible for him to crack.  But maybe that was partly his fault.  He wasn't a family man after all, and kids weren't his thing.  So he opened up another beer and took out another cigarette, and turned the TV up a little louder, anything to drown out that awkward silence that only a shared space can make.

He wasn't surprised on the day his nephew left.  As Makoto saluted, his bag thrown over his shoulder, Kasai suddenly realized that his nephew had grown taller than him.

"Thanks for everything, Kasai-san."  Makoto always kept the formality between them, as if they were two strangers who had just happened to live in a small apartment for over two years.

"Take care of yourself," Kasai nodded towards him.  He didn't need to know where he was going.  He had received a phone call that day saying that an apartment was arranged for Makoto to stay at.  He didn't know the terms of this "gift", but assumed it was for Makoto to remain what he has always been, a nobody.

Makoto waved in response and grabbed for the knob.  He was halfway out the door when Kasai found himself speaking, but completely unaware about what he was saying.

"Feel free to call, Makoto, if you need anything, I mean."  He stumbled over his words like some rookie, but unlike work, he had no rule book to fall back on here.  "We're…family, after all."

Makoto remained still, his back to him.  Looking at him, at his height, as his shape, Kasai couldn't help but think, he really does look like his father.  I wonder…if he hates that.

"Thank you, Kasai-san, but I'll be fine."  And with that said, Makoto stepped though the door.  All he left in the apartment was a room so clean, it looked like no one had lived there, and these words that seemed to echo with the closing of the door.

"It's not a family that I want."

Kasai stood in the entranceway and listened as his nephew trudged down the hall.  He remained there for a while, and as he stood, he listened to the quiet, to the silence that only a person alone could make.  After what felt like a long time, he turned away from the door and headed down the hall to the kitchen and to the six-pack of beer that was in the fridge.

"I wonder, kid…I wonder what the hell you want."

He didn't know if he'd ever see Makoto again although a part of him believed he'd stumble upon him somewhere, because no matter how much the boy acted like a nobody, he still had a knack for winding up in noticeable places.  He imagined he'd see him lost in the smoke of some game parlor, or maybe somewhere in the back streets of Chinatown.  A dark part of his mind, the part he tried to keep locked at work, the part he tried to forget when he went home, believed he might find him in that back street, limp, and gone, the winner of too many games, or taken down by the hand of some random staff member of his father's.  No one was more surprised to see that Makoto slipped past all these expectations and became in one day's time, the head of the Izumo gang's youth division.

"I saw some kid, looked like your nephew, working over in Sanada's section of town.  You wouldn't believe this, Kasai, but I think he was…collecting," one of his coworkers told him as he was pouring coffee.  He said it like it was some secret, but Kasai knew full well that the mob was no secret to the police, nor was the way they worked.  He wondered if this was the time he was supposed to mumble some excuse or grow red with the embarrassment that only family can bring upon you.  But he didn't do either because families weren't his thing.

"I know," he said, bringing the cup up to his lips, mixing the bitterness of the coffee with the taste of the cigarettes that never fully left his mouth.

And time to time, he did stumble into Makoto, and as the case on that new drug continued, he stumbled into him more.  Kasai wasn't going to lecture him about what not to do, or who not to work for.  It was like his own crooked-cop, pack-and-a-half day habit stopped him from saying anything that a "normal" uncle might say.  Instead he only left the Izumo's Group's Youth Division Head with a wave and a warning under his breath.  

"Watch out for that Sanada.  He's rotten right through."

He didn't even know if that little bit of advice was worth saying.  He thought he was watching his nephew spiral out, cutting all ties not just to the past, like his mother had years before, but to everything around him.  Unlike her, it seemed like the kid didn't even care if he lived or died.  Yet for some reason he kept plugging away- in the gang, in the mahjong parlors- moving in a direction that Kasai couldn't see, but still going all the same.

"It's like…"  He sat back in the seat of his patrol car, his partner, Araki, sitting next to him.  "He's looking for something.  And that's the only reason why he keeps going."

"Something?  Like what?" Araki asked.  He was still noticeably confused about the relationship Kasai had with this tall kid who had been sitting in the station just hours before.

"I don't know, but everything else is just there to keep him busy until he finds it."  He stared out onto the street.  He was tired from that day.  The latest corpse just piled on top of the growing mountain of questions linked to this new drug…this WA.  And he didn't know if his blood connection to the Izumo gang would help with it, but it was worth a shot.

"But, Kasai-san, was it right to tell him all about the case?"  Araki hid none of his suspicions towards Makoto.

"Ah, hell, he knew all the info we gave him anyway."  He shrugged.  "Who knows, he might even know more than us.  I got a hunch though…while he's doing all that looking, for whatever the hell he's looking for, maybe he'll find something that we can use."  He tapped his ashes outside the car and watched the grey sky darken into night.   "…And maybe, maybe he'll find what he really wants." 

He had no idea though on that day, as he sat in the car, letting the smoke drift out through the window, letting the cold winter air come in, how right his hunch was. 

tbc-


	2. All Things Familiar: Now

Warnings and disclaimer still apply

All Things Familiar - Now

He'd received the phone call to confirm a few hours before, and he'd spent the rest of his day off picking up around the apartment.  It had been awhile since he had guests over.  After vacuuming the floor, he looked across at his living room in all its sparseness.  He didn't need to be a detective for over twenty years to know that _this_ was the apartment of an aging single man.  He turned a full circle and sighed at what he saw.  Was there a way of making this place look a little bit more comfortable, he wondered, a little bit more like a home and not just a flophouse for an old geezer?  He sucked in his breath as he realized he'd forgotten about his magazines.  He scooped them up off the couch and went into the bedroom.  Normally he wouldn't care if they were seen, but for some reason, it felt better to let the ladies spend some time in the closet for the night.  As he was throwing them inside, he noticed something that he had forgotten to bring out when the weather started to chill a month earlier.

He scratched his head.  Would this be a little too much, he wondered.  Going back and forth in his mind, he couldn't decide if using it would really matter, but the cold air that seemed to carpet his floor between November and March reminded him of why it might add some extra comfort to guests.  

"What the hell," he said, reaching into the closet.  "It's winter anyways.  Isn't this what people use in winter?"  He took it out, piece by piece.  He had to dig around behind the boxes until he found the comforter.  He brought it up to his face and smelled it, making sure the mildew hadn't colonized it completely.  "…It'll do, I guess."  

He brought it all into the living room and began setting it up, screwing the legs into the bottom frame first and then placing the comforter on top.  Last he laid down the large table top over it.  Standing back, he looked at the kotatsu.  It had been a long time since he'd seen it fit to warm more than one person.  He bent over and plugged the attached cord into the wall and sat down, placing his legs underneath the table.  After a minute, he could feel the warmth building up under the blanket.  The mildew smell wafted up with the heat, but he shrugged it off with a "What can you do?" and dropped his arms down on the table's surface.  He didn't remember laying his head down.  All that registered was that his legs suddenly felt so warm.  

It was the knock that jolted him awake.  He blinked his eyes open and for a moment he didn't recognize where he was.  Then he remembered that he'd cleaned and that's why the living room looked so different.  He got up slowly and instantly regretted pulling his legs out from the heated table.  He checked the clock as he walked down the hall.  

Almost six-thirty.  "Leave it to him to come an hour late."  He opened the door and found two red-nosed faces looking back at him. 

Eyebrows raised, Kasai opened the door wider.  "My guess from the look of you two is that it's pretty cold outside."

"It's freezing!"  Tokitoh pushed past Kubota and rushed inside.  He was holding his hands over his ears, covering them completely.  Kasai noted that it was cold enough to warrant gloves on both hands.  He turned to see Tokitoh kicking off his shoes and then looked back to the other boy still standing outside the door.

"Are you coming in?" he asked.

"Just waiting to be invited." Kubota smiled.

"Heh, like that ever stopped you before."  Kasai waved him in.  

"Someone has to be polite, Kasai-san."  Kubota ducked inside.  "What with the Great Tokitoh already looking through your fridge."

"Am not!"  Tokitoh's voice carried over from the living room.

These kids never changed, he thought, shaking his head.  "What took you two so long anyways?"

"Somebody had to finish a video game before we left."  Kubota bent down to slip off his shoes.

"It was the stupid game's fault!"  Tokitoh poked his head back in the hall.  "It wouldn't let me save with the last bosses!"

"Okay, okay, it's fine."  Kasai rolled his eyes.  "It doesn't matter-"  He stopped when something was slipped over his wrist.  He looked down to see a plastic 7-11 bag hanging from his arm.

"We also picked something up for you on the way."  Kubota smiled at him and headed down the hall.  Kasai looked in the bag to see a six-pack of Asahi.

"I love how the underage kid buys the cop the beer," he muttered, following his nephew.

It was his idea originally.  It had been a week before, and they had been standing outside an apartment down near the docks.  Its former occupant was the latest victim of the drug that both he and Makoto were searching for information on.  His nephew's motivation was different from his official police work though.  Makoto's incentive was standing right there next to him, hugging his arms around his chest, complaining about the cold.

Kasai had to stop himself sometimes, or else he'd get caught staring at them.  The way these boys worked though was so funny to him.  He had lived with Makoto for two years, and yet here, watching him interact with this kid who had no memory, it was like meeting a whole new person, someone completely different from the nobody boy he once played against.  This "cat" his nephew picked up was a real puzzle to him too.  One second, the boy would be threatening to rip your arm off, and the next, he'd be sleeping peacefully against Makoto's shoulder.  But Kasai found out that the kid was a puzzle to himself as well.  And that's why they were standing there outside the door as other officers were finishing on cleaning up.

"Looks like I called you two out here for nothing."  Frowning, Kasai glanced back into the apartment.  Blood stained the wall where the body had lost to the drug inside it.  There was little evidence outside of the corpse on the ground, its remaining limbs transformed and contorted, the fur and the claws covered in the same red that streaked the walls.  As for the drug that caused it, that "WA", there was nothing.  Once again, Kasai was met with another bloody wall of no information on this case, and once again, Makoto's cat was faced with no more clues on his own private search.

After first looking inside, Tokitoh's eyes avoided the corner where the corpse was, and he remained out in the hallway, trying to stay warm.  He was only wearing one glove that afternoon, and he kept his other uncovered hand in his pocket.  Makoto reached out and gently rubbed his shoulder for a moment before pulling his hand back.  It was a motion that only lasted a few seconds, but Kasai had noticed it, even if Tokitoh hadn't looked up.  It was little things like that, touching, looking, and even speaking, where Kasai saw how much, in just a year, his nephew had changed.  Why, he wasn't totally sure, but what he was sure about was-

"Ahem."  Someone coughed, and Kasai blinked.  He turned to look over at Makoto who had made the noise.

"Something wrong, Kasai-san?" he asked.

"Um…uh, no.  Why?"  He shook his head.

"You were staring.  I thought something was on your mind."  Makoto replied, leaning against the doorway.  

He had done it again.  Kasai had to stop himself from smacking his forehead.  "Nah, just…thinking about this." He waved to the inside of the apartment.  In the way Makoto was looking at him, he didn't think his nephew bought his lie.

"Well, if that's it for today, I guess we'll be off."  Makoto saluted him and started down the hallway.  "C'mon, Tokitoh."

"…Oh, okay."  Makoto's words seemed to snap the other boy out of his thoughts.  He turned to Kasai.  "Thanks, Pops, for calling us and all."  While still not looking inside, he waved his gloved hand to the apartment.  "Maybe next time we'll find something."  Shoulders slumped, he followed after Makoto.

Watching them retreat down the hall, Kasai couldn't help but think, I sure hope so, kid.  Even if it's just for your sake.

And his thoughts followed up with, and that would probably be for Makoto's sake too, I guess…

And then, watching them walk away, he couldn't help but think, what about my sake, eh?  What about this tired old man who seems to find nothing but red walls and ripped-up bodies?  His gaze fell to the corner where one stray arm lay, as if it had been torn off and tossed aside, like it had no other use but to bleed onto the floor.  He grimaced at it.  What struck him the hardest about this case was that they realized the victim had died probably a month earlier.  It was the many complaints about a smell in the hall that forced the off-site manager to stop and pay a visit.  That's when they were called in, and that's when he called Makoto.  Only this time, there was nothing to find, but some poor fuck who died alone, leaving only skin and a smell behind.

That's going to be me too, he thought.  It's going to be me alone, dead on the floor, and some fucking cop is going to come by and complain about how shitty I stink.  It's going to be me, all alone, probably with the fucking TV still on.  It's going to be me too, all alone-

The boys were still walking down the building's stairs when he reached them.  He was out of breath from running the few flights to catch up, and both turned to look at him.  Tokitoh's eyes were wide in surprise, but Makoto, seemingly unfazed by him following them, had that familiar half-smile on his lips.

"Hey, are you kids-" he wheezed.  His hand reached instinctively for his cigarettes as he talked, even though he knew they wouldn't help with his breathing.  "…busy next Sunday?"

And that impulse led him to now, following his nephew into his unrecognizably clean living room.  He stopped when he saw Tokitoh staring at the table.

"Why's that got a blanket around it?" the boy asked, pointing to the comforter.  

"It's to keep the heat in."  Makoto answered.

"What?"  Tokitoh looked from him back to the table.  "Whaddya mean, heat?"

"Just sit down and see."  Makoto patted his shoulders.  Kasai watched the boy slowly settle down on the ground.  Having Tokitoh around was like living with a foreigner, except this foreigner could speak your language.  He just had to be introduced to things that every other person his age took for granted.  Poor kid didn't remember anything from before Makoto picked him up, and by the way he acted at first, violent and sharp like some cornered animal, Kasai figured that maybe that was a good thing.  He didn't want to think of what made a kid that way.  Maybe his past was one like Makoto's- ignored and abandoned.  But unlike his nephew, Tokitoh seemed to want to find his past.  Kasai's gaze fell on the boy's gloved right hand that was lying on the table.

His past, and whatever happened that brought on-

"Ahem."

He looked up from Tokitoh to see Makoto's eyes on him.  He felt his face warm up as he realized what just happened.  Scratching his head, he turned towards the kitchen.  "You two settle down here.  I'll get dinner ready."

"Hey, Pops, what are you cooking?"  Tokitoh, figuring out what the kotatsu did, had slid half of his body under the table.

"Okonomiyaki," he called back as he went to open the fridge.  He was going to need the cabbage…the pork…

"Ha, I win!  I told you it wouldn't be curry!"  At the shout, Kasai poked his head back into the living room to see Tokitoh pointing towards Makoto and beaming triumphantly.

"Don't tell me you two had been betting on me," he muttered, turning back to the fridge.

"Well, it's just that I remember what you used to cook." Makoto replied.  He walked over and leaned against the door frame into the kitchen.

"Don't forget I won!"  Tokitoh called out to his back.  "Pay up."

"Later, I promise," was all his nephew answered.  Kasai felt a shiver run down his back.  He didn't know if it was the chill from the open fridge, or the tone in Makoto's voice that caused it.  Something about that "later" felt a little too rich in meaning for him.

He started to pull out the food when he felt a presence directly behind him.  He turned to see Makoto's tall figure standing over him.  The light was behind his head, so his whole face was left in shadows.  Kasai squinted up at him.  "Thought I told you to sit down?"

"Yeah, but thought I'd come in and see if you needed any help.  Assist the elderly and all that."

"Ah, fuck off."  Kasai stood up, cabbage in hand.  Makoto was giving him that half-smile again, and Kasai never knew who it was mocking more.  He looked down at the head of cabbage in his hands.  It had been a while since he had to cook for more than one person.  His fingers pressed in, feeling the cool leaves beneath their skin.

"So, is that a no to help?" Makoto's voice pressed him, as cool as the leaves.  

If this was a game, Kasai thought, it would be my move next, wouldn't it?  He smiled at that.  It had also been a while since he had played his nephew.  That was their real element, wasn't it?  Not family dinners, not sharing a space, but playing the game, the back and forth until one wins.  His eyes met Makoto's and he hoped his smile looked just as crooked.

"You want to help, smart ass?"  He tossed the cabbage at him.  "Then while you're cutting out the bull shit, chop that up too."

"Hai, hai."  Makoto saluted him with his free hand and went over to the sink.

They worked in silence for a few minutes.  Makoto washed and prepared the cabbage, and Kasai got out the rest of the ingredients.  While he was searching for the okonomiyaki mix, his hand fell on a bag of crackers.  He took it out and looked at it for a moment.  "You hungry?" he asked.

"Nope."  Makoto shook his head as he began to slice into the cabbage.

"Hm.  Maybe Toki-boy would want some of these." He turned towards the living room.

"He would, probably, if he were awake," Makoto said.  Kasai looked out to see the other boy curled up in the blanket with only his head poking out.  Eyes closed, his face was one of pure peace and contentment.  Kasai quietly walked over to the doorway.

"…He really does look like a cat sometimes, doesn't he?" he asked, almost to himself.

"Yep.  But he sure does get mad when I tell him that." Makoto replied.  "Just like a cat would."

"Heh."  Kasai leaned against the door frame.  The kid looked so different now than when he first met him, almost a year before at Makoto's apartment, the apartment that his father was putting up.  Back then, this cat looked like someone had tried to suck the life right out of him.  He was just shade, pale, and thin, but his temper still was strong, and Makoto's scratched cheeks and hands were proof of that.  

It was his bandaged nephew who met him at the door on the day he saw Tokitoh for the first time.  He had called Kasai earlier, asking him to come over.  "I want to show you something," he said without any other explanation.  It was while he stood in the hall on that cold winter's day when Makoto offered his little addition to his phone call.

"Before I let you in, Kasai-san, you have to promise me one thing."  Makoto held the door half-open so his body blocked any view inside.  As he talked, one hand absently traced a band-aid on his chin.  "You won't report this to the police.  You won't report this to anyone."

"Look, Makoto, what the hell is going on-"  He stopped himself as his nephew's expression fully registered.

His usual half-smile was gone, replaced by a frown as serious as the gaze that met his own.  "Call it a favor, if you want." Makoto said, his voice low.  "A favor between."

He never finished that sentence, but left it in the air as if seeing if Kasai himself could fill in the answer.  A favor between…family?  Friends?

They weren't either of those things, at least they weren't before.  Kasai looked down and dug around for his cigarettes.  They weren't anything before except competing players, and never then did Makoto ask for a favor, even when he lost money or he needed cigarettes.  He didn't even ask if he could live with him.  He just came and left.

Makoto had never asked him for anything.  Not once.

And maybe that's why, before he even entered the apartment, he decided.  He lit the cigarette at his lips, and as he breathed in, he nodded, and the smoke seemed to nod with him.

"…Yeah.  If that's what you want."  Because, you've never asked me for anything before.  And if this is the only thing that this shitty old uncle can give you- "I promise."

And that's when Makoto invited him inside for the first time.  And Kasai saw another life of his nephew that he never knew about.  He wasn't cutting school this time though.  Makoto, who loved new things, but who never got attached to anything, not even to his family, finally picked up something so strange, so rare, that he wanted to keep it.

How did you do it, kid, he wondered, his gaze resting on Tokitoh's sleeping face.  I still don't get why he just picked you up like that, and I still don't get how you found him in all that mess that he was-

His thoughts were interrupted as he felt the package of mix slip from his hands.  He looked up to see Makoto holding it.  

"Are we ready to make this?"  His nephew looked at him quizzically.  

Caught staring again, Kasai tried to cover his embarrassment up with a sudden cough.  "Ah, jeez, my throat's all dry."  He patted his chest lightly.  "I think I'm gonna grab one of those beers."  Avoiding Makoto's gaze, he turned back to the kitchen, leaving his earlier thoughts and the sleeping Tokitoh behind.  

Opening the fridge, he pulled a can out from the six pack.  "You want one too?" he asked.

"Sure."  Makoto answered.  There was no drinking age in this apartment.  Of course, Kasai knew there were no kids here either, no matter how old they were.  

Kasai tossed him a can and opened his own.  "Let's get this thing started before your cat wakes up."

Neither of them spoke as they worked.  As he was mixing the packet into a bowl, he glanced over at Makoto who was slicing up the pork.  This strange quiet, interrupted only by chopping and stirring, brought on another memory, one from years before, before Tokitoh, before Makoto's new life.  They were like this in the kitchen.  Makoto was in his school uniform, which was still too short in the sleeve.  It was after work, and Kasai was cooking.  It was always something quick then, something easy, something a man and a boy, or a man and an almost-man could eat with little work and little complaint.  Makoto sat on the stool with a book in his hands.  After his attempt at conversation received the usual "little of this, little of that," Kasai took the only thing he could grab, since the right words were obviously out of reach.  "Here," he said, placing a bowl and some potatoes in front of Makoto.  "Take a little of those," he pointed to the potatoes, "and a little of that," he placed a peeler in front of him, "And make yourself useful."

"Okay." Makoto shrugged and started to peel.  Then the kitchen fell back into their quiet again, but this time it felt more comfortable.  As he listened to Makoto peel and slice, he thought, it's not just me now.  Now it's the two of us.  He smiled, and was glad his back was to the boy.  Even if we don't talk, maybe…maybe this is okay.  Maybe this is what it's supposed to be.  Doing something…together.

Still remembering, Kasai held the stirring spoon still, and without looking up, spoke.  "Doesn't this remind you of old times?"

"Hm?"  Makoto gathered the small pieces of pork into a pile on the cutting board. 

"Right now."  Kasai left the spoon in the bowl and waved at the kitchen around them.  "Makes you think of old times, huh?  Us, back then, doing this?"  He went back to stirring.  "Makes me think back."

"Not me."  Makoto replied.  He scooped up the pile of pork and walked over to him.

"Why not?  We've done this before."  Kasai moved his hand as Makoto dropped the meat into the mixing bowl.

"No."  Makoto looked down at the bowl and then to Kasai.  Kasai returned his gaze, and in that moment, saw again how much his nephew had changed.  

"This was never our old times, Kasai-san.  This was never us."  He turned back to the counter and began to clean it.

Kasai stared back into the bowl, stirring the meat into the mix until it was completely covered.  Yeah, he thought.  Who am I kidding?  This was never our old times.  This was never us…

Our kitchen was never this warm, and the food never smelled like this.  And we never had the ease that a family should have when they're in the kitchen, talking and cooking, laughing, and just…being together.  

He felt so old then and his stirring slowed.  So much had gone wrong.  So much could have been different.  He didn't know where or how he could have changed it, but the heaviness of Makoto's truth weighed on him.  Lost in thought, he looked down at the mixing bowl in his hands, and couldn't remember why it was there.  And then it slowly dawned on him.  Why he ran down those building steps, why he had rummaged in his cabinets to find food to feed more than one, and why he had taken out the kotatsu, piece by piece.

"Maybe," he murmured, his words coming out as slow as his stir.  "Maybe…this is what old times are supposed to be like.  Right now, I mean."  He turned to Makoto.  "You know?  Maybe this is how it's…supposed to be."

Makoto looked back at him from where he stood.  Kasai could only describe his expression as "blank".  It wasn't its usual easy-going smile, nor was it anything close to the seriousness he knew was possible.  Instead, he was looking at the same Makoto that he looked at countless times across the mahjong table.  The memory was so clear, the air between them seemed to grow even smokier, and instead of bits of cabbage scattered across the counter, it was the all-too familiar tiles.  Times when they played like this, it was easy to forget about the others playing with them.  It was just him against Makoto's nobody-ness, and most times, it was the blank that won.  Why, he never could figure out, but now, as he stood facing this calm, blank boy, he was starting to get a clearer picture.

Before he always looked for something in Makoto, anything- a sign of what his tiles were, a sign of what strategy he was planning, a sign of life inside him.  And always, he found nothing, and always he lost to that nothing.  It made him think that maybe Makoto was so good at "staying inside", that not even he, an experienced detective whose job it was to find clues from nothing at all, could figure him out.

But then something happened, or rather, _someone_ happened- happened right on him, and that blank that Makoto always kept on his face shifted into something else.  When he smiled, it was fuller, and his eyes took on this softer tone, and he did things, like reach out to gently rub a shoulder, that he'd never do before.  It was so strange to Kasai, this shift, this change.  He'd catch himself staring at both Makoto and Tokitoh, just wondering what the hell happened.

But standing in the kitchen, holding a mixing bowl in his arms, and looking back at Makoto's blank face, he realized he had been wrong.  It wasn't that Makoto had changed so much.  It was the fact that his nephew, from somewhere in his past, probably as far back as when he lived with the family that had dissolved his very existence, had learned not to cover up his emotions, but reflect others.  When you looked at Makoto, it wasn't about what he was hiding from you, it was what he was showing you, and he was good at showing you yourself.  Across the table, whether it was for dinner or for mahjong, Makoto's face revealed all the nothing that was in Kasai's own.  And when he's with Tokitoh, walking with him, sitting with him, laughing with him, his face showed the life that was pouring out of the other boy's.           

Why did it take so long to see this?  That with Makoto, you get what you show.  You show him a killer, you get a killer and more.  You show him nothing, you get nothing and more.  The only thing you don't get is a connection.  You never connect with him, because he's only giving you yourself back, never him.  

A memory, a voice, ghosted the back of his mind.  He could still hear the footsteps trudging down the hall, walking away.  _It's not a family that I want._

No, Kasai thought.  Why would you want a family, when family has given you nothing to want in the first place?

His gaze left Makoto's and moved towards the living room.  

Except, maybe…if you're Makoto, and you meet someone who has nothing, but wants something, wants something more than anything, like Toki-boy, and suddenly you find someone looking at you with that nothing-but-wanting face, and all you can do is reflect it back-__

His stirring hand stilled as it slowly clicked together.

Maybe…after all this nothing that's he's been shown…he just wants someone to look at him, like the way Toki-boy does…and just show him what something from nothing looks like so he can do it too.

"…Kasai-san?"  Makoto's voice broke into his thoughts.  "Are you alright?"

Kasai turned his gaze from the living room to him and saw Makoto, eyebrows raised, looking expectantly back at him.

I know how you play, Makoto.  Kasai put the bowl on the counter.  You play off others' moves, and here, I thought I was playing this entire time when in reality, I've never played a move against you.  I've given you nothing to play against.  Nothing.  And I know now that if I want something from you- for you, for me- that I gotta make the first move.

He picked up his beer.  "…So, if this ain't like old times, I guess that means," he said, holding the can in the airs towards Makoto, "here's to the _new_ old times then."

He waited, his hand in the air.  He tried to keep his arm still.  He tried to keep his eyes on Makoto's and not turn away.  If this was his very first move, his first real move, he wasn't going to get scared and fuck it up.  And then he remembered that he hadn't given everything yet.  Still looking at Makoto, he smiled, not crooked, but full and wide.  He knew it probably looked more sad than happy, but maybe that's what all his smiles look like.

This is all I have, kid.  He raised the beer up higher.  Now, show me what you got.    

Like back in the parlors, he waited for his move.  He watched as Makoto turned and with his right hand, the hand he always used to place his tiles, he picked up his beer can.  Slowly, he raised it up, and Kasai watched in quiet wonder as Makoto's smile went from half to full, just like his.  

He tapped Kasai's can with his own.  "To the new old times then."

He didn't know who'd won this game, and suddenly, he didn't care.  They brought the cans to their lips and drank, and Kasai, inside, drank to everything- to all that they had failed, and to all that they had found.  Maybe now, maybe now they could restart, make it a whole new game.  He licked his lips.  "Better late than never, right?"

Before Makoto could reply, another voice broke in.  "What's late?"

They both turned to see Tokitoh enter the kitchen, rubbing one eye with his gloved hand.  "Hey, I wanna beer too."

Makoto held up his can.  "You can have some of mine."

"Nah, I want my own." Tokitoh reached for the fridge, but Makoto took his hand first and placed the can against his palm until the other boy accepted it.

"This way tastes better."  He winked.

"Huh?  Is that true?"  Tokitoh looked over to Kasai as if seeking confirmation.  Kasai's hand was at his face, covering his mouth.  Shit, Makoto, he thought.  What the hell do you teach this kid?

"I'll tell you what will make it taste better," he said, turning away from his smirking nephew.  "Some food to go with it.  Come here, Toki-boy.  I'll show you how to make these."  He waved him over to the stove and started to warm up the skillet.  "Not everyone can make these as good as me.  But if you watch closely, maybe you'll figure it out."

Tokitoh's attention was intent on the stove.  "Hey, Kubo-chan, you got to watch too."

"Why do I have to watch now?" Makoto asked, sidling up next to him.

"'Cause if you watch, you'll know how to make it, and then you'll stop making that curry shit all the time."

"Now, now, Curry's not all bad," Kasai said, adding some of the batter onto the skillet.

"See?"  Makoto patted Tokitoh's head.  "Listen to the elderly.  They know what's right."  

"You're getting whatever burns for that one, smart-ass." Kasai waved the spatula at him.

Makoto picked up a pot lid to shield himself, and Tokitoh fell back, laughing at them both.  With his hands full at the stove, Kasai couldn't hide the smile spreading on his face.

As he began to flip the first cake over, he shook his head, still laughing.  

To the new old times, huh…I guess this is what they're supposed to feel like.  Warm, and loud, and…

He turned his head, and watched as the two boys began to sword fight with spoons.

…and something so strange, you can only call it…family.

---

He woke up slowly.  It took a minute to register that the dark he was in was not a dream, but simply his clean living room.  He lifted his head up and looked down at the surface of the kotatsu where he had fallen asleep.  It was mostly clear except for a scattering of cookie crumbs still on the table, the ones they had brought out after dinner while they all watched TV.

He massaged his cheek with his hand and wiped the line of drool that had slipped down his chin.  It didn't take him long to realize he was alone again.  The apartment was quiet and dark, even the TV was off.  He got up from the table, grimacing as the cold from the room attacked his warmed legs.  He ambled over to the kitchen and flicked on the light.  He squinted, adjusting to the change.  As he was blinking away the dark, he noticed something new taped to the fridge.  He grabbed the piece of paper and looked down at it.

"Thanks, Pops, for dinner," he read aloud.  "It was really good.  I'll make Kubo-chan make it next time."

And beneath that, in a different but also familiar scrawl, it read: Thanks, Kasai-san, for showing him something new.  Now I'll never hear the end of it.  Next time, make curry, like the good old days.

"Smartass," he shook his head, smiling.  "Always got to be a fucking smartass."  He went to toss the note in the trash, but then thought better of it, and taped it back up.  After that, he opened the fridge, his hand already inside before he realized that what he wanted was gone.

"Fucking kids drank all my beer."  He swore, but the anger never really came.  The smile on his face couldn't be wiped off that easily, even if his beer was gone.  He looked at the kitchen.  It was still a mess from dinner, but he shrugged.  He'd worry about that tomorrow.  One messy night won't be the end of the world.

Going back into the living room, he looked down at the kotatsu.  It felt so strange to look at now, with no one to crowd around it and drop crumbs all over it.  He laughed quietly, remembering.  Or sleep underneath it like a cat.  He bent down and reached to lift the table top off.  Something like this was too strange for an old man to keep out.  It was so out-of-place from the dust and the magazines that normally crowded his living room.

As he lifted the top, he felt a rush of hot air rise out, and he remembered that he had left it on.  He put the top back down and turned toward the wall where it was plugged in.  He started to pull on the cord, when a thought stopped him.

Is it really that strange…to have it out?

Yeah, he answered himself.  It's just me here, and I'm hardly here anyways, and this place ain't that big to begin with, let alone have some table crowd it up.

But a voice, someone that sounded just like him, replied back.  But ain't this a part of it, old man?  Ain't this a part of your new old times too?  Or was that bullshit you were serving back then with dinner?  Are you just gonna put this back in the closet with everything else that you don't wanna deal with?  Bury it away, just like she did?

He sighed, letting go of the cord.  He really was going nutty if he was arguing with himself and losing.

"Hell, it's winter anyways."  That was a fine reason to leave it out.  Even if it was just him here, and even if it took up the whole fucking living room.  It still would keep his feet from freezing off.

He sat back down on the floor and placed his legs under the blanket again.  He knew he should get up and go to bed, but a little while longer won't be bad, he reasoned, while it's out and all.  And besides, he thought as he laid his head back down on his arms.  Might as well use it now.  He closed his eyes, and let the warmth slowly work its way up from his feet to his legs to his middle-

After all, it wasn't just him anymore.  He had a couple more reasons to keep it out.

^^


End file.
